First off, I agree with your husband about not using the cards. However, I would go one step further and say that you shouldn't be using debit cards either. It's much easier to spend money using a debit card than it is to spend it using cash. Switching to cash is not an easy thing, but it is very enlightening.

2 or more years to get rid of $30K in debt doesn't seem unreasonable at all. You didn't get into the debt overnight, and your husband shouldn't expect to get out of it overnight either. Selling your house to get rid of the debt seems like a really MAJOR commitment and doesn't tackle the issue of what got you into debt in the first place. Imagine that you sell the house, move someplace smaller (you'll inevitably need to spend money on repairs here and there, and for things that you didn't think about before the move). A year from now you won't have that $30K in debt, but you won't have that $50K in equity either. You'll be sitting on empty cards, tempting to be used again because you're not used to living on your (potentially) smaller salary.

Others may disagree, but I think working hard to pay off the $30K without tapping into the equity is the way to go. You'll get a great sense of accomplishment and you'll be less tempted to charge up the cards again. You're more likely to work hard and cut costs to pay off that debt if it's still sitting there than you would be to work hard and save up the $30K for something else.

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